Remember that one day when you could wake up without an alarm? When you would get your favorite bowl of cereal and sit between the hours of 8 and 12? This is a blog dedicated to the greatest time of our childhood: Saturday mornings. The television programs you watched, the memories attached to them, and maybe introducing you to something you didn't realize existed. Updated every weekend.

Pound
Puppies was a flash-animated reboot of the toy franchise, and the second
cartoon based on them. Pound Puppies continued to be popular throughout the 80s
and early 90s. At the turn of the century, the toys were redesigned to abandon
their original generic model to represent actual dog breeds. However, the line
soon came to an end in 2002 (Funrise would
gain the rights and restart the
line in 2014).

During this time, Tonka, who had introduced
the Pound Puppies to the American market after gaining the rights from Irwin Toy, ran into
financial trouble after purchasing Kenner Parker in 1987.
They themselves ended up needing to be bought out and were purchased by Hasbro in 1991. In 2009, Hasbro entered into
a joint venture with Discovery
Communications to re-launch the Discovery
Kids channel with family-oriented programming. Since Hasbro was responsible
for acquiring and developing the programming, they turned to their own toy
franchises as the starting point for them. Pound
Puppies became one of the launch programs for the network that would be
known as The
Hub.

Niblet, Strudel, Lucky, Cookie and Squirt in front of Shelter 17.

Like the original
animated series from the 80s, Pound
Puppies focused on a group of dogs who operated in secret out of a dog
pound to find “a pup for every person, and a person for every pup”. However,
this time the dogs, designed by Martin
Ansolabehere, were less anthropomorphic and more dog-like; resembling their
respective breeds instead of the generic style of the original toyline. Amongst
the Pound Puppies is Lucky (Eric McCormack), a German Shepherd/Scottish
Terrier/Golden Retriever/Jack Russell Terrier mix, the group’s cool and
collected leader; Cookie (Yvette Nicole Brown), a Boxer, the tough-talking but
sweet second-in-command; Niblet (John DiMaggio), an Old English Sheepdog, who
was clumsy and dim but had a big heart; Strudel (Alanna Ubach), a German
Dachsund, the resident egotistical genius of the group that invented all the
gadgets used by the Pound Puppies—particularly the computer database that
helped find puppies matches; and Squirt (Michael Rapaport), a Chihuahua, the
street-smart pessimist of the group who was Niblet’s best friend. They worked
underneath Shelter
17 at the Happy Valley shelter with the aid of Strudel’s squirrel assistants
(who handled her building due to her lack of fingers). A running gag included
Lucky and Cookie’s unspoken attraction for each other; unspoken because every
time Lucky got the nerve to act on it something would interrupt him.

The Super Secret Pup Club: Cupcake, Rebound and Patches.

As the series progressed, it was shown
that the Pound Puppies were just one of many units around the world. They even
had an unofficial side branch, the Super
Secret Pup Club, started by Patches (Jessica DiCicco): a Dalmatian
puppy that idolized Lucky. Cats even had their own version called the Kennel Kittens,
which were run by Ace (McCormack) and Fluffy (Brown), who were virtual copies
of the Puppies in cat form. Pups adopted out were given a doghouse-shaped tag
for their collars, because “once a Pound Puppy, always a Pound Puppy”.

McLeish and Olaf.

The human running the pound was
Leonard McLeish (Rene Auberjonois); a short-tempered man who hates his job and
always demands things be done the right way. His employee was the eccentric,
kind caretaker of the pound, Olaf Hugglesbjork (M. Emmett Walsh), and often
helped visitors find their ideal pet. Ketchum was
the silent, seemingly emotionless dog catcher that would bring new dogs to the
pound, often instigating that episode’s quest.

The series ran for 3 seasons, ending
after 65 episodes; enough needed for syndication. It has continued to air on
The Hub and its successors in reruns. In 2012, Hasbro produced a new line of
toys for the show, adapting several characters into plush toys
and small
figurines. The plush toys came with an adoption certificate, which was also
available through a website. Shout!
Factory released 57 of the episodes across 11 DVD collections
between 2012 and 2016.